Southtown Read Free

gave a damn about finishing it. Zeke suppressed a schoolboy giggle.
    “Shut up, freak,” Luis said.
    “
You
shut up, spic.”
    Luis started to go for him, but Pablo grabbed his shirt collar.
    “
Both
of you,” Stirman said, “cool it.”
    “We got Riggs’ car keys,” Elroy murmured. “Don’t see why—”
    “No,” Stirman said. “We do it right. Patience.”
    Pablo didn’t like it, but he got a D-string ready. He curled the ends around his hands, moved to one side of the door. Luis took the other side.
    Stirman sat down in his chair, in plain sight of the entrance. He crossed his legs and read through his testimonial notes. The son-of-a-bitch was cool. Pablo had to give him that.
    Pablo’s finger throbbed where the pastor had bit it. The copper guitar string stung his broken skin.
    Finally he heard footsteps on gravel. The rookie supervisor appeared with a heaping plate of ribs.
    Stirman smiled apologetically. “Pastor Riggs wants to talk to you. Prison major came by.”
    “Hell,” said the supervisor.
    He started toward the vestry and Pablo garroted him, barbecue and baked beans flying everywhere. The supervisor’s fingers raked at the elusive string around his neck as Pablo dragged him into the corner.
    The rookie had just gone limp when Grier came in.
    Luis tried to get him around the neck, but the old marine was too wily. He sidestepped, saw Zeke’s soldering iron coming in time to catch the blow on his arm, managed one good yell before Elroy came over the table on top of him, crumpling him to the floor, Grier’s head connecting hard with the cement.
    Elroy got up. He was holding a broken piece of white glass and a mess of red rags. The rest of the glass was impaled just below Grier’s sternum.
    Grier’s eyes rolled back in his head. His fingers clutched his gut.
    C.C. slapped Elroy’s arm. “What the hell you do that for?”
    “Just happened.”
    They stood there, frozen, as Grier’s muscles relaxed. His mouth opened and stayed that way.
    Five minutes later, they had his body and the garroted rookie stripped to their underwear. The rookie was only unconscious, so they tied him up, taped his mouth, crammed him and Grier’s corpse into the tiny vestry with the comatose Reverend.
    Elroy and Luis got into the supervisors’ clothes. Grier’s had blood on them, but not that much. Most of Grier’s bleeding must’ve been inside him. Elroy figured he could cover the stains with a clipboard. Luis’ clothes had barbecue sauce splattered down the front. Neither uniform fit exactly right, but Pablo thought they might pass. They didn’t have to fool anybody very long.
    Elroy and Luis put the supervisors’ IDs around their necks. They tucked the laminated photos in their shirt pockets like they didn’t want them banging against their chests.
    C.C., still in prison whites, made a call from Pastor Riggs’ desk phone, pretending he was the Maintenance Department foreman. He told the back gate to expect a crew in five minutes to fix their surveillance camera.
    He hung up, smiled at Stirman. “They can’t wait to see us. Damn camera’s been broke for a month. We’ll call you from the sally port.”
    “Don’t screw up,” Stirman told him.
    “Who, me?”
    With one last look, Pablo tried to warn Luis to be careful. He couldn’t shake the image of his cousin getting shot at the gate, his disguise seen through in a second, but Luis just grinned at him. No better than the stupid gringo Zeke—he was having a grand time. Luis threw Pablo the keys to the Reverend’s SUV.
    Once they were gone, Stirman picked up the phone.
    “What you doing?” Pablo asked.
    Stirman placed an outside call—Pablo could tell from the string of numbers. He got an answer. He said, “Go.”
    Then he hung up.
    “What?” Pablo demanded.
    Stirman looked at him with those unsettling eyes—close-set, dark as oil, with a softness that might’ve been mistaken for sorrow or even sympathy, except for the hunger behind them.